Old-Fashioned Chocolate Cake
{Cuisine At Home} and modifications by Happy Healthy Home
3 cups all purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. table salt
2 cups hot water
3/4 cup vegetable oil
2 Tbsp. distilled white vinegar
1 Tbsp. instant coffee granules
1 Tbsp. vanilla extract
Preheat oven to 350 degrees with rack in center. Spray two 8x2 inch round cake pans with nonstick spray. {First time I made this the cakes did not leave the pan well with just non stick spray. So, 2nd time I greased with butter, floured the pans and put a round piece of parchment paper in the bottom. A bit of extra work yes, but worth it to have them come out of the pans so cleanly}
Whisk together flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda and salt in a large mixing bowl.
Combine water, oil, vinegar, instant coffee and vanilla in a large measuring cup. Add to the dry ingredients and whisk just until combined - a few lumps are okay.
Divide batter between pans, then bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. 30-40 minutes.
Cool cakes on a rack for 15 minutes, then invert them onto the rack. Leave cakes upside down to cool completely.
Glossy Chocolate Icing-
To ensure the icing sets up, use heavy whipping cream, which contains 36% or more milk fat. They aren't kidding about this. 2 times I have made this and did not have whipping cream on hand...making my own substitution "heavy cream" did not yield good results if you want the icing to SET UP. But, it did taste DEE-licious and everyone here was lickin' the plate. I did 1 cup milk with 1/4 cup melted butter to it if you are interested to know.
1 stick unsalted butter (I used salted)
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/4 cups unsweetened cocoa powder
pinch of salt (omitted because of salted butter)
1 1/4 cups heavy whipping cream
1/4 cup sour cream
1 tsp. instant coffee granules
2 tsp. vanilla extract
Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium heat.
Stir in sugar, cocoa, and salt.
Mixture will be thick and grainy.
Combine heavy cream, sour cream and instant coffee in a large measuring cup, mixing until smooth. Gradually add cream mixture to chocolate until blended and smooth. Cook until the sugar has dissolved and the mixture is smooth and hot to the touch, 6-8 minutes. Do not boil.
Off heat, add vanilla. Cool icing at room temperature until spreadable. (2-3 hours) I put mine in the fridge and it still didn't help it in setting up...but again it was really good!
Now then you can go ahead and frost your cake as you would a normal double layer chocolate cake.
But here is where I took a little of my own liberty~ well, in truth this was Mr. HHH's idea. He thought it would taste even better if we made "Grandma's Frosting" and put it in the middle of this cake. So that's the white frosting you see in the middle.
This gets a little more time consuming to do it this way but worth it for the taste. C'mon you can do this!
Half Batch of Grandma's Frosting
2 Tbsp. Flour
1/2 cup milk
Mix flour and milk in saucepan and cook with whisk stirring constantly on low until thickens to consistency of cream. Then, cool in water bath in sink while mixing below. (water bath means to put the pot in your stopped up sink with cold water in it. I recommend putting a LID on your pot...just sayin')
In my 8 cup glass measuring bowl I add~
1/2 cup of granulated sugar
pinch of salt
1 stick of butter
1 tsp. vanilla extract
Combine sugar, salt, butter and vanilla. Mix with beaters for 5 full minutes. Yes. 5. This is important. Add the cooled flour mixture 1 tablespoon at a time. You don't have to measure this out, just use a real metal tablespoon from your silverware drawer and "whocker" it in there okay?
Keep mixing until it reaches a nice fluffy consistency.
This gave a nice thick layer for the middle of the cake.
(double it if you want it for the whole cake)
whew....it's a longer recipe to type up but quicker than driving to a store for a box mix and canned frosting and well, you know so much Happ-ier and Health-ier and Homey-er for you!
so yes you can have your cake and eat it too!
And to my 1 reader who I know does not like coffee taste...you really don't taste the coffee in here, it just adds a little something good but does not leave you with a mocha/coffee taste at all. Try it you'll like it. :-)
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